Hidden Mickey 5: Chasing New Frontiers Page 7

  Blain turned up the radio, listening to the often-time hilarious ‘Mark and Brian’ morning show. It was a “Best of Mark and Brian” show—a repeated episode, since it was a Saturday, but the program always made him laugh, often out loud, making the short twenty minute-drive to the Park from his apartment in Orange, when the traffic wasn’t too bad, seem shorter. The songs played when Mark and Brian weren’t talking on-air about concerts, celebrities, or playing a prank on someone, were some of the classic rock songs Blain’s own rock-band played at local clubs, college dorms and fraternity parties, as well as at various events held throughout Orange County.

  Blain’s band, SECOND EXIT, was composed of three other Disneyland cast members and a female lead singer who was a friend of a friend of the bass player, Bill Roberts. A wildly fun band, SECOND EXIT enjoyed a terrific following; a broad range of ages came to their shows, not to mention a number of fellow cast members who loved dancing to the classic and upbeat tunes that Blain and the band played.

  Tapping his fingers on the top of his steering wheel to the beat of a Fleetwood Mac song that was playing, Blain drove to Disneyland looking forward to his Saturday at work. The weather was ideal for working on the canoes. Blain looked forward to a day in the sun, the workout that came with paddling a sizable canoe with sixteen guests on board, and an overall pretty carefree afternoon at the “Happiest Place on Earth.”

  In addition, Blain was looking forward to his band playing at the Caper’s Club tonight, a fun, laid back nightspot that was close to Disneyland and where a lot of cast members came after work. Seeing friends at the club, enjoying the energy of the dancers on the floor and mixing it up with his fellow band mates as they played their repertoire of nearly forty songs, Blain knew that today—and tonight especially—was going to be one of excitement and high spirits…and who knew what else!?

  Summers at Disneyland were never hard on the eyes as many of the female guests dressed…comfortably. It was always interesting to see what the Park attendance might be like on any given day. In addition, the camaraderie of working with many fun-loving young adults, like himself, always made it feel like he was back in high school, playing on the tennis team and hanging out with his friends after school or after tennis practice. It wasn’t quite like the weekends he had often spent on the sandy beaches of Newport or Huntington Beach, where he and guys on the tennis team would stake an area and spend the day throwing footballs and Frisbees, and sometimes, even taking their tennis racquets on the beach and practicing their volley skills. Yet, working at Disneyland was many times like those carefree days of sunscreen and flip-flops: Watching for lovely ladies, or “quail” as Blain’s senior-citizen tennis coach Mason often called them, was a sport that didn’t exist just at the beach.

  Driving into the Disney employee parking lot on the south side of Katella Avenue, Blain parked his black 2009 Chevy Camaro in the “Pluto” section of the cast member lot. He locked the doors with his keychain remote and then hustled to the shuttle area where a tram was idling with a number of other employees waiting to go into work. The tram transported cast members the third of a mile route to Harbor Boulevard, turning right and then left into the East Esplanade, the large shuttle loading zone for all the various Anaheim hotel shuttles. Entering through the cast member entrance at Harbor Point, the employee’s main access to work, Blain scanned his identification card which electronically “clocked” him in.

  Enjoying his second summer working at the Park where Blain had met so many friends, he truly looked forward to most every day at work. Having finished his first full year as a high school biology teacher, Blain felt his summertime job at Disneyland was a perfect way to make some extra money over the three months when he was not in the classroom. However, it was sometimes amusing when a few of his students would come across him at the Magic Kingdom, eliciting an excited, “Mr. Walters, we didn’t know you worked her!” response upon recognizing their teacher.

  After clocking in, Blain walked leisurely backstage to the employee locker rooms, and changed into his “Grey Poupon” mustard-yellow canoe shirt and brown, fringed pants and moccasins. Probably the most comfortable costume worn in the Park, it was the only costume in Disneyland where the guys—and the few women working the canoe attraction—never had to wear socks.

  Walking through the Park on his way to his 10:00 am shift on the Davy Crocket Explorer Canoes in Critter Country, Blain enjoyed watching the guests, seeing the different faces. He was always intrigued at the thought of such diversity, just like the saying, ‘no two snowflakes were alike.’ Working at Disneyland on a daily basis one grew to see that diversity much more clearly. Likewise, such an experience gave Blain that strange ability to foresee things, anticipating what some people were going to do or say, just by subtle cues of posture, type of clothing, and especially nationalities. Most cast members would acquire that skill over time working in the Park which probably was the reason that guests in the Park often believed that Disneyland only hired seemingly extremely intelligent cast members. Almost all the employees eventually seemed to develop a ‘sixth sense’ while working there.

  From the cast member’s locker rooms, the Davy Crockett Explorer Canoe attraction was just about the furthest place in the Park to walk to within the “on-stage” areas. But Blain never minded the walk and strode through the Park with a smile and a confident stride that seemed to move him through the crowd as if he could anticipate the position of hundreds of people in front of him long before he came near them.

  Blain could always spot the ‘newbie’s,’ those inexperienced cast members who had just been hired. They would be the ones having to say, ‘excuse me’ over and over and were always hopping around because they would walk in front of some guest every ten steps and have to dodge them or do what Blain called “the Elvis”, where the cast member would try to move in one direction, then his feet would go the other. It always created a look of doing hip gyrations that Elvis Presley made famous. It also always reminded Blain of someone playing “chicken” because the new employee wouldn’t know which direction to move to avoid a head-on collision with a guest until it was often too late. While running head-on into an attractive guest might be a way to strike up a conversation, Blain didn’t think it was the best way to meet someone new.

  Walking with a lithe gait, an athletic glide really, Blain looked like he was hardly moving. As a top-ranked tennis player in high school, Blain was indeed a good athlete. But two summers working on the canoes also gave him a physique that could have placed him on the cover of a body-building magazine. Paddling a canoe eight hours a day developed his arms, shoulders and back; body parts that were not just well defined, but his arms completely filled the rolled-up sleeves of his canoe shirts—as well as the shirts he wore outside of work.

  Most of the girls working the Park were certainly aware of Blain Walters.

  But Blain also had a personality that was as unpretentious as it was just plain sexy.

  Blain seemed unaware of the glances the female cast members sent his way. He was pleasant to everyone; the guys, the girls, good-looking and the plain, Blain always was friendly and easily bantered with everyone he met, making everyone laugh and instantly feel comfortable. His confidence and comfortable personality also made him the chosen “front man” of his band, usually the one making comments and talking to the crowd between songs.

  His looks also occasionally had a way of drawing longing or adoring looks by some of the female guests in the Park. And sometimes, a few of those girls would make a point to go on the canoe ride if for no other reason than to see guys like him up close and personal.

  Sometimes very personal.

  One Year Earlier

  Less than a month into his new job at Disneyland, Blain had discovered why the Park was not only the “Happiest Place on Earth” for the guests. On his twenty-second birthday, Blain was scheduled to work his regular eight-and-a-half hour shift on the canoes. He had come into work at 9:30am and later took his lunch break around
one-thirty in the afternoon. It was at lunch, when his lead foreman that afternoon, Carl Eaton, said something to him while they stood in line waiting for their food in the cast member eatery below Pirates of the Caribbean.

  “Blain, someone gave this to me to give to you. Don’t know what it is all about.” Carl said nonchalantly, tossing a folded piece of paper onto Blain’s tray.

  “Uh, thanks, Carl,” Blain said, pocketing the slip of paper into his canoe pants and grabbing the plate of food he had ordered, sliding it onto his tray as he moved along the U-Shaped cafeteria-styled employee restaurant. Carl was a short, quiet Canoe Lead with a brown crew cut; a man of few words, Blain was learning.

  Blain took a seat at an empty table in the back of the DEC, the “Disneyland Employee Cafeteria”, often called the ‘PIT’, not because of the race cars that were at one time painted on the walls in the room, necessarily, but the general impression of the food served. Blain, probably because he was so new at the time, actually enjoyed the food and felt that the food, and the cast member’s prices, were both reasonable. He figured in time, he would probably become a bit more jaded like those who had been working much longer.

  Sitting by himself for a change, Blain pulled out the note from his pocket. Between bites of French Fries, Blain read what he saw as obviously female handwriting with a quizzical look on his face.

  The note read, “Meet me at the exit of Haunted Mansion…I want to give you your birthday present. 2:15 pm. Love the way you wear your ‘skins.’”

  Reading the note over, Blain was uncertain of both the intent as well as the integrity of it. No signature, no name at all; just an invitation. And a comment, Blain assumed, that described the way his simulated leather pants fit.

  Or was it an invitation? Blain had his doubts. He was so new, having only worked at the Park for less than a month, he couldn’t imagine what kind of pranks and practical jokes were played on new guys like him. He remembered in high school, the pranks played on freshmen. Blain looked around the DEC and figured—or, at least hoped—that everyone working at Disneyland, being older than high school aged kids, were above executing embarrassing pranks.

  But he was not all that sure.

  He looked at his watch which read 2:08pm. He knew he still had about twenty minutes remaining before he had to be back on the canoe dock. He glanced around the DEC dining area where there were fifteen round tables with four or five chairs at each. It was past the normal lunch hour, but at Disneyland cast members kept varied schedules and the DEC was busy even after two in the afternoon. Most of the tables were occupied by a cornucopia of costumed employees. Cast members from rides like Haunted Mansion, Jungle Cruise, Tom Sawyer Island Rafts, and Indiana Jones mingled with merchandise members from Frontierland and New Orleans Square. Janitorial staff members in their all-white pants and shirts sat with security guards and outdoor food vendors, each taking their own break or lunches. Blain could not identify anyone that might be the ‘guilty’ party who gave the note to Carl to give to him. He looked around for Carl, wanting to ask him directly who gave him the note. Carl was sitting with his girlfriend, Betsy, who worked in the Silver Shoppe in New Orleans Square.

  Walking over to their table carrying his tray of partially-eaten food, Blain pulled up a chair at the table with the couple.

  “Sorry to bug you guys,” Blain said assuming the two probably wanted to eat lunch alone.

  “Hey, Blain! Have a seat,” Betsy said with a pleasant smile. “How are you enjoying the canoes?”

  “Oh, it’s great,” Blain said sliding into a chair opposite Betsy. “Where else can you get paid to work out?”

  Betsy laughed as Carl deadpanned, “Well, wait another year or two and see if you still feel the same way.”

  Blain shrugged. “You’re probably right.” He waited a second then pulled out the folded piece of paper from his pocket.

  “I see you have a fan club,” Betsy said even before he could unfold the sheet or ask Carl about it.

  “What? Betsy, are you talking about this? How do you know about this?” Blain held up the paper with his eyebrows crunched together.

  Betsy looked at Carl who just shrugged while taking a bite of his BLT. She turned back to Blain and smiled. “Well, Blain. Let’s just say there are a few young ladies—and even a couple more mature ones—who find you not just attractive, but very sexy,” Betsy said with a sly look on her face.

  “So you know who this is?”

  “I didn’t say that. Maybe I do, maybe I don’t,” Betsy said with a shrug and proceeded to take a take a bite from a salad that was on her plate, offering no more information.

  Blain leaned back in his chair, slightly frustrated. Finally without a word, he stood up, grabbed his tray of food and walked back over to the table he had been sitting at earlier.

  “Thanks for nothing, Betsy!” he called back over his shoulder half kidding.

  “You’re welcome, Blain,” Betsy sang back.

  There was only one way to find out the mystery to the note, Blain figured.

  After quickly finishing his French Dip sandwich and half his fries, Blain dumped his leftovers in a trash can and left the underground cafeteria. He went to his left and walked up the stairwell that took him back up to the Park level, taking two steps at a time. He then pushed the ‘Cast Members Only’ door open next to the men’s restroom in New Orleans Square and proceeded around the back of the French Market restaurant, striding past its patio with guests enjoying a late lunch, then on down towards the river making a left towards Critter Country.

  The trek would take him past the Haunted Mansion and past the exit of the attraction. Blain fingered the folded note in his canoe pants pocket, wondering who might be there.

  * * * * * *

  May 16th, 1964

  Walt Disney’s Office,

  Burbank California

  “Marc, I’m sorry,” Walt Disney said to Marc Davis who was standing in front of Walt’s desk. Marc’s newly scripted show and narration for the Haunted Mansion attraction was now held in Walt’s hands. Walt had glanced over the half-inch notebook filled with sketches, typed dialogue, and hand written notes. More than anyone, Marc knew how hard it was for Walt to again postpone the development of the attraction; he knew that Walt really wanted to see the Mansion open.

  The big, stately, Southern mansion had been sitting in New Orleans Square empty for over a year, nothing inside but a hollow shell of a house. Davis had worked with Ken Anderson on developing many ideas for the Haunted House attraction, one that Walt had wanted in the Park from the very start. Anderson himself had come up with at least four renditions of both story lines as well as ride designs, all of which were deemed undoable at the time.

  “With all the activity going on right now, we need to set it aside a bit longer. Let’s look at these ideas at the first of the year,” Walt added facing Davis as he sat on the corner of his desk in his office.

  Davis was actually a little relieved even at the expense of the additional hard work he had done in preparing yet another scenario for Walt’s Haunted Mansion.

  At the time, the Park was going through its greatest transition, the most intense and ambitious changes to have taken place in all of the nearly ten years since the Park had opened in 1955.

  In addition to redesigning and reinstalling Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, It’s a Small World, the Primeval World and the Carousel of Progress, all of which were Disney-designed attractions that were being transported to Disneyland from New York at the close of the World’s Fair there, Marc Davis had been busy with the final work on the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction. The new Pirates ride was going to be the Park’s most ambitious ride yet.

  All of this undertaking, and yet, the Park was also in the middle of rebuilding Tomorrowland completely.

  The Mansion, unfortunately, would sit empty for another five years, collecting dust and, presumably more ghosts and happy haunts, as well as teasing a great number of guests who were likewise dying to get in and
see just what was inside the big, mysterious mansion. Rumors and legends alike began circulating; some that said workers were systematically vanishing from the job or that the mansion actually did open but was so scary people were dying of fright or having heart attacks on the spot. While not one of the rumors was true, initially, such rumors were subject to fear that it would be bad publicity for Disneyland. Yet, such stories only heightened the mystic about the attraction when it finally did open.

  Four years later, in 1968, Claude Coats was teamed up with Marc Davis again, as they had with the design of Pirates of the Caribbean a couple years earlier. Together, the two worked to see that the Haunted Mansion would finally become a reality. Unfortunately, it would open two years after Walt Disney’s death, a reality that still literally haunted many who had been especially close to Walt.

  Indeed, the Haunted Mansion was such a long tease that the public had been waiting over six years to see what was inside the ominous house.

  Seven days after the Haunted Mansion opened on August 9th, 1969, the Park set the one-day attendance record of 82,516 guests. Now that was indeed a scary day!

  * * * * * *

  June 13th, 2009

  After his lunch and short conversation with Carl and Betsy in the Disneyland Employee Cafeteria below Pirates of the Caribbean, Blain slowly approached the Haunted Mansion on his way to the canoe dock. With the mysterious note Carl had given him folded in his pocket, Blain cast a furtive look towards the Haunted Mansion exit; all Blain saw were happy guests emerging from the ride. He honestly didn’t know who he could be looking for. He was so new at the Park he had not yet met many other cast members other than those who worked the Davy Crockett Explorer Canoes with him. He was beginning to figure someone was just trying to playing a trick on him on his birthday, although, Blain didn’t know how anyone outside of administration would even know it was his birthday. He anticipated someone jumping out and yelling, “Candid Camera” if he went looking too hard for some phantom female. Maybe Betsy and Carl were in on the prank, Blain started to think.